Werewolves Are Real!

Recent Story, Werewolf sighting

Modern Transformation Case

An archaic form of Chivian, Baelish is written much as English
was written a thousand years ago. The alphabet contains twenty-four
letters. Every letter is pronounced, even when this seems
impossible, as incnihtandhlytm.
...Many Old English words have gone out of use:wermeaning "man" survives only in
"werewolf." Others have survived unchanged--ahwælis still a "whale." Cniht, which originally meant "boy,"
(cnihtcildwas a "boy
child") was transformed into "knight," and thekwas still being pronounced when English spelling was
standardized a couple of hundred years ago. She carried the scroll to the long
table at which Duraid, her husband, was already at work. He looked
up as she laid it on the tabletop before him, and for a moment she
saw the same mystical mood in his eyes that had affected her. He
always wanted the scroll there on the table, even when there was no
real call for it. He had the photographs and the microfilm to work
with. It was as though he needed the unseen presence of the author
close to him as he studied the texts.
Then he threw off the mood and was the
dispassionate scientist once more. `Your eyes are better than
mine, my flower,' he said. `What do you make of this
character?'
She leaned over his shoulder and studied
the hieroglyph on the photograph of the scroll that he pointed out
to her. She puzzled over the character for a moment before she
took the magnifying glass from Duraid's hand and peered through it
again.
`It looks as though Taita has thrown in
another cryptogram of his own creation just to bedevil us.' She
spoke of the ancient author as though he were a dear, but sometimes
exasperating, friend who still lived and breathed, and played
tricks upon them.
`We'll just have to puzzle it out, then,'
Duraid declared with obvious relish. He loved the ancient game.
It was his life's work.

The subjects of the Testaments, Old and
New, are taken from very primitive and inartificial life. With the
exception of the writings of Paul, and in a less degree Luke, there
is little evidence of literary culture, or of a wide and varied
range of thought, in their authors. They narrate plain facts, and
they promulgate doctrines, profound indeed, but addressed less to
the speculative and discursive, than to the moral and spiritual
faculties; and hence, whatever may have been the capabilities of
Hebrew and of classical Greek for other purposes, the vocabulary of
the whole Bible is narrow in extent, and extremely simple in
character. Now, in the early part of the sixteenth century, when
the development of our religious dialect was completed, the English
mind, and the English language, were generally in a state of
culture much more analogous to that of the people and the tongues
of Palestine than they have been at any other subsequent period.
Two centuries later the native speech had been greatly subtilized,
if not refined. Good vernacular words had been supplanted by
foreign intruders, comprehensive ideas and their vocabulary had
been split up into artificially discriminated thoughts, and a
corresponding multitude of terms. The language in fact had become
too copious, and too specific, to have any true correspondences
with so simple and inartificial a diction as that of the Christian
Scriptures. Had the Bible then for the first time appeared in an
English dress, the translators would have been perplexed and
confounded with the multitude of terms, each expressing a fragment,
few the whole, of the meaning of the original words for which they
must stand; and whereas, three hundred years ago, but one good
translation was possible, the eighteenth century might have
produced a dozen, none altogether good, but none much worse than
another. We may learn from a paragraph in Trench what a different
vocabulary the Bible would have displayed, if it had been first
executed or thoroughly revised at that period. One commentator, he
says, thought the phrase "clean escaped" a very low expression;
another would reject "straightway, haply, twain, athirst, wax (in
the sense of grow), lack, ensample, jeopardy, garner, passion," as
obsolete; while the author of a new translation condemns as
clownish, barbarous, base, hard, technical, misapplied, or
new-coined, such words as beguile, boisterous, lineage, perseverance,
potentate, remit, shorn, swerved, vigilant, unloose, unction,
vocation, and hundreds of others now altogether approved and
familiar.

"...the English of the King James Version is not the English
of the early 17th century. To be exact, it is not a type of
English that was ever spoken anywhere. It is biblical English,
which...owes its merit, not to 17th-century English--which was very
different--but to its faithful translation of the original."

"...the King James Version is enduring diction which will
remain as long as the English language remains..."

"...the current attack on the King James Version and the
promotion of modern-speech versions is discouraging the
memorization of the Scriptures, especially by children..."

"...modern-speech Bibles are unhistorical and irreverent. The
Bible is not a modern, human book...On the contrary, the Bible is
an ancient, divine Book...Hence the language of the Bible should be
venerable as well as intelligible, and the King James Version
fulfills these two requirements better than any other Bible in
English."

"...modern speech Bibles are unscholarly. The language of the
Bible has always savored of the things of heaven rather than the
things of earth. It has always been biblical rather than
contemporary and colloquial."

"...the King James Version is the historic Bible of
English-speaking Protestants. Upon it God, working providentially,
has placed the stamp of His approval through the usage of many
generations of Bible-believing Christians. Hence, if we believe in
God's providential preservation of the Scriptures, we will retain
the King James Version, for in so doing we will be following the
clear leading of the Almighty."

Let me see if I am following what a certain preacher is saying.
When I first heard him preach, in the park, he was using the
NIV, but he
told me I could go by the KJV
if I wanted. Then after hearing some of the his sermons, I wrote and asked
why the he didn't use the KJV
more, as to me it seemed more appropriate. he replied that he had
the liberty to use another version. I responded that while
Christians do have much liberty, the Bible is what we have in
common, that it is hard enough to reconcile all our differences got
from the same Bible, without having different Bibles
to boot. And the preacher eventually responded that many in the
congregation use the NIV
and he thinks it best to use it in the his sermons. Then for our
church-in-the-parking-lot celebration a following Sunday, he used the
RSV, and told us that
sometimes the older versions are better. Finally, in his latest sermon
the preacher used as an illustration that we should pick the regular
coffee over the decaf, as full strength is better.

Now I am trying to sort this out. I read a recent news
release about some villagers in India claiming to have seen a wolf
come out of the forest then turn into a man and walk away. The
authorities came up with an official version that the villagers had
just seen a wolf, to which the villagers replied, yeah, but the
wolf turned into a man and walked away.

I think of the villagers as giving me the full strength thriller
version while the official one is decaffeinated. I mean, I am not
going to lose any sleep over a story of someone seeing a wolf come
out of the forest in India. Wouldn't trouble my slumber at all.
But if the story says the wolf turned into a man and walked off, I
might start wondering if maybe the man didn't get on a plane, or
maybe he has some relatives in America.

Likewise, if someone starts telling a scary werewolf story,
but has modernized the language to call it a
man-wolf---oops!--person-wolf, I think I can handle it. My sleep
would not be all that troubled by a story of a person-wolf traipsing
around. In the politically correct fairy tales the children don't
get eaten any more.

But if the story uses the old language, which I am nevertheless
familiar with, I start thinking in terms of an ancient apocalypse
in nature that maybe I should fear. Aren't we supposed to fear God?
Isn't that what it means by staying awake, alert? And if it is
better to avoid the decaf in favor of the regular, why is the
preacher still using the NIV?

The scholar working on his manuscript has the genuine article in
front of him to work with, not just the decaffeinated lore:
photographs, microfilm. "Now, in the early part of the sixteenth
century, when the development of our religious dialect was
completed, the English mind, and the English language, were
generally in a state of culture much more analogous to that of the
people and the tongues of Palestine than they have been at any
other subsequent period. Two centuries later the native speech had
been greatly subtilized, if not refined." I couldn't think of a
better analogy than to say the KJV is regular and the newer versions decaffeinated.

So if the preachers are saying the KJV is better, which it is, why
are the preachers still preaching from the NIV? Doesn't the
preacher want the his congregation to fear and reverence God?

Joan brought in another cup of
coffee on a silver tray and offered it to Bartholomew, who
had, apparently, placed his order with her on arrival.
Bartholomew sipped it.
"Damned fine coffee," he said.
There was something vaguely British about
him, Stone thought, perhaps more than just the hand-tailored suit.
"Thank you. We drink it strong around here." "The way I like it,"
the big man replied. "Never could understand
that decaf crap. Like drinking nonalcoholic booze. Why bother?"
Stone nodded and sipped his own coffee. "We don't have much time,
Mr. Barrington, so I'll come to the point. I have a niece, my dead
sister's only child, name of Erica Burroughs." He spelled the
name. "She's twenty, dropped out of Mount Holyoke,
involved with a young man named Lance Cabot."
"Of the Massachusetts Cabots?" "He'd like people to think so,
I'm sure, but no, no relation at all; doesn't even know them;
I checked. Young Mr. Cabot, I'm reliably informed, earns
his living by smuggling quantities of cocaine across international
borders. Quantities small enough to conceal on his person or in
his luggage, but large enough to bring him an income, you
follow?"
"I follow." "I'm very much afraid that
Erica, besotted as she is, may be assisting him in his endeavors, and
I don't want to see her end up in a British prison."
"She's in Britain?" Bartolomew nodded. "London,
living with Mr. Cabot, quite fancily, in a rented mews house in
Mayfair." He opened a briefcase and handed Stone a file with a
few sheets of paper inside. "Don't bother reading
this now, there isn't time, but it contains everything I've been able
to learn about Cabot, and something about Erica, as well. What I'd like
you to do is go to London, persuade Erica to come back to New York with
you, and, if it's possible without implicating Erica, get young Mr. Cabot
arrested. I'd like him in a place where he can't get to Erica. For
as long as possible, it goes without saying."
"I see." "Will you undertake this task?
You'll be very well paid, I assure you, and you will lack for no comfort
while traveling."
Stone didn't have to think long, and mostly
what he thought about was Sarah Buckminster, another relationship
he'd managed to f__k up, though it
wasn't really his fault. "I will, Mr. Bartholomew, but you must
understand that I will be pretty much limited to whatever
persuasion I can muster, within the law, and whatever influence
with the authorities I can scrape up. I won't kidnap your niece,
and I won't harm Cabot, beyond whatever justice I can seek for him,
based on crimes that are real and not imagined." "I understand perfectly,
Mr. Barrington. I'm well aware that you are a respectable attorney
and not a thug for hire. I'm also informed, by a number of people,
Samuel Bernard among them, that you are a resourceful man and that
your background as a police detective gives you entrée to certain
places."
"Sometimes," Stone admitted, "but not
always. There are limits to what an ex-policeman can do.""I understand. I simply
want you to do whatever you can."
"On that basis, I'll go," Stone said.
...

It seems to me that the preacher's sermon on decaf is eminently
applicable to Bible selection.

REVELATION

The God whom we worship is neither an
aspect or force of nature, nor is He an invention of legend and
myth. He is a living Person who reveals Himself in history in the
concrete situations and events of our common life. The Bible is the
record of that historical revelation; and in reading and expounding
it we come into direct relation with that revelation. The Bible is
the source and fountain of the truth that we believe and the hope
by which we live. Without it our worship, no less than our Faith,
would wither and die.

We do not want that "source and fountain of the truth" to be
"scairt" like decaffeinated coffee, nonalcoholic booze, dead works,
heartless worship.

If I can substitute potent drink for strong coffee and the salt mine
for the pits there's a country song fitting the sermon: Alan Jackson -
It's 5 o'clock somewhere

If we take the word of God as that strong medicine to keep us from
going insane, then I say it's five o'clock somewhere. By that I am
referring to the fact that the Bible dialect à la KJV is not the English dialect
spoken in the early 17th century or at any other time in history,
but it was made through the centuries, from Wycliffe to Tyndale to
the KJV team, to best
correspond to the state of Biblical languages as they were spoken
by the men of God who spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost,
in the tongue and to the people of God's timing and choosing. A
lunchtime cocktail just doesn't quite capture it. But it's five o
'clock somewhere, and I seriously doubt if the Lord has any
disagreement with me going to the King James Version.

I follow the thought of, (Zech. 13:2-5) "And it shall come
to pass in that day, saith the LORD of hosts, that I will cut off
the names of the idols out of the land, and they shall no more be
remembered: and also I will cause the prophets and the unclean
spirit to pass out of the land. And it shall come to pass, that
when any shall yet prophesy, then his father and his mother that
begat him shall say unto him, Thou shalt not live; for thou
speakest lies in the name of the LORD: and his father and his
mother that begat him shall thrust him through when he prophesieth.
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the prophets shall be
ashamed every one of his vision, when he hath prophesied; neither
shall they wear a rough garment to deceive: But he shall say, I am
no prophet, I am an husbandman; for man taught me to keep cattle
from my youth." I don't think modernity--modern speech--is an
idol to be worshipped. Since the NIV lies to us, in the name of the Lord, I take
a few pokes at it from time to time. And I do not let the cover of
my own copy deceive but have pasted over the word HOLY
so my copy says, PROFANE BIBLE.

Our teacher made a point in his last Sunday school class, that our
leaders watch out for our souls, (Heb. 13:17) "Obey them that have
the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your
souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with
joy, and not with grief: for that is unprofitable for you."
A sister in class pointed out that in her interlinear Bible: The
King James, the Revised Standard, and the Living all say pretty
much the same thing, but the New International Version leaves out
the word soul: "They keep watch over you." The
NIV is that
scairt coffee the preacher tells us not to choose.

I see it as my mission to use what persuasion I can to get God's
people weaned from the NIV, and then to try to put
Zondervan out of business so they can't hurt anyone. But I'm sort
of like that ex-cop who only has so much influence. As long as the
preachers are not setting a good official example, there is only so
much I can do within my fellowship.

Permission is hereby granted to use the portions original to this
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credit given, of course--in intellectually honest non-profit
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The material I myself have quoted has its own copyright in most
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I have
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illustration
in this nonprofit teaching endeavor. The sources are included in
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cannot say how other
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